Friday, September 20, 2013

Throwing Down the Gauntlet - "Rational" People Will Be Convinced By the Science - IPCC

There are encouraging signs that, this time, climate scientists are coming prepared for a fight against the forces of denialism.

You can tell the Fossil Fuelers and the rest of their supporting cast in the denialist community have their knickers in a bunch over the pending release of the next IPCC report on climate change.

Their worry over the report's findings has sent them into a tizzy rehashing the "5 Stages of Denialism" - 1. Deny the Problem Exists; 2. Deny We're the Cause and Deny the clear
Scientific Consensus; 3. Deny It's a Problem; 4. Deny We Can Solve It;
and, 5. Claim It's Too Late for Anything but Adaptation.

Now the chairman of the IPCC, Rajendra Pachauri, has fired a shot across the denialists' bows, saying "rational people" will be convinced by the science in the new report.

"There will be enough information provided so that rational people
across the globe will see that action is needed on climate change,"
Pachauri told a conference call.

"I really wouldn't want to say
anything about any perceived effort for a pushback," he went on. "We are
doing our job and we are reasonably confident that rational people in
government and all over the world will see the merit of the work that
has been done."

Organisations that dismiss the science behind climate change and
oppose curbs on greenhouse gas pollution have made a big push to cloud
the release of the IPCC report, the result of six years of work by
hundreds of scientists.